26th February 2015, The Swan Hotel, Bradford on Avon, Wiltshire BA15 1LN
Guest poet Susan Utting was fabulous - her dry -humoured repartee between poems was deliciously entertaining, and the poems themselves brimmed over and over with the messy tumble of life as it's lived. I loved the wide range of subjects that came under her scrutiny - everything from getting a hearing aid to stuffing a zebra... plus her parents' pub, buying tulips for yourself, and hairdressing as a metaphor for moving on at the end of a relationship. She's one of those performers you just don't want to stop. And then there were the open mic performances - some excellent poems from, among others, Lesley Saunders, Linda Saunders, Stephen Payne (thanks for the challenge of the double dactyls!), Josephine Corcoran and Rosie Jackson, Words & Ears regulars Mark, Francis, Kate and Paul, and new/quite new contributors Martin and JJ. Thank you to everyone for sharing their words - and lending their ears.
